Emma Bruns
Emma Bruns is a trauma surgeon and publicist for, among others, NRC Handelsblad. As a speaker, moderator, and interviewer, she connects the different worlds within healthcare: doctors and managers, part-time young physicians and traditional medical specialists, innovative startups and established medical giants.
Throughout her studies and training, this connection has been a central theme. During her PhD at Amsterdam UMC, she developed the app ‘Fit4SurgeryTV,’ which helps older patients become fitter and stronger before surgery. She believes it is essential that technology connects patients and healthcare professionals rather than creating mistrust.
She worked, among other places, in Zambia, Nepal, and Curaçao, and wrote about this for NRC, using the self-reliance and creativity of healthcare workers as inspiration for healthcare in the Netherlands. According to Emma, autonomy for healthcare professionals and “breathing room” within the system are essential to retaining healthcare staff. This also formed the basis for her increased focus on the importance of sustainable healthcare (the Green OR).
In the final years of her training, she chose to specialize in trauma surgery, a field that requires making critical decisions under great pressure. During this period, after completing her training, she ultimately made a difficult but clear decision: out of the white coat—it is time for doctors not only to continue specializing further.
In the coming years, she will focus more on prevention, such as with the startup PreventiMed, which aims to put an end to the BMI doctrine. She also advocates for greater interdisciplinary collaboration between different fields, such as ADORE, which connects neurology and oncology. In addition, through her own program ‘the mastodon and the young dog,’ she organizes conversations between different generations in healthcare.
Keynotes and lectures:
The art of doing nothing: achieving more by doing less in healthcare
Those who want to be effective know what to leave out. Albert Einstein’s best mathematical formulas, Max Verstappen’s fastest pit stop, and the most beautiful buildings by architect Mies van der Rohe are all the result of removing the unnecessary. In healthcare, innovation almost always means doing more—and that leads to more registration, more confusion, more absenteeism. This must and can be done differently.
Factor: how we keep young doctors engaged
Frustrations around the coffee machine can run high. Not only in healthcare, but across many sectors, the young complain about the old and vice versa. The young are said to lack resilience and no longer know what hard work is. The older generation does not understand that work should be more than just the prospect of a promotion or a bonus—especially in the public sector.
Summer guest for one day
Do you have a special colleague who is retiring and would you like to honor them in an original way? Make him or her a summer guest for one day. Emma conducts an interview using photos or film fragments that played a key role in his or her—or perhaps your—career.